DhimmicRAT Hipocracy in Action

Despite complaints by anti-smoking groups and some DhimmicRAT activists, the National Democratic Club was granted an exemption from the District-wide smoking ban that took effect January 2, 2007.

According to the District’s Department of Health, the National Democratic Club (NDC) is one of only eight establishments in Washington, DC, granted an exemption, and the only private club on the list. Under the law, exemptions are possible for tobacco bars that generate ten percent or more of their annual revenue from the sale of tobacco products, and for retail tobacco stores that generate at least 75 percent of their revenue from the sale of tobacco products.

The National Democratic Club’s official website offers no description as a retail tobacco store, nor does it state the club is a tobacco bar.

Angela Bradbery of Smokefree DC, an anti-smoking lobby, told Roll Call in January that the DNC’s attempt at an exemption was “pretty outrageous” and “the height of hypocrisy.” While the group lists the seven other establishments granted exemptions, there is no mention of the NDC on their website.

“As Members of Congress, we must be held to a higher standard,” Pelosi said when announcing her own smoking ban in Speaker’s Lobby of the U.S. Capitol. “We can no longer risk the health of colleagues, staff, pages, reporters and others who pass through the Speaker’s Lobby each day.”

Because of the exemption, those protections do not extend to workers at the NDC. Ironically, Pelosi at the time “applaud(ed) the District for…recognizing the need to protect the public from secondhand smoke.”

But despite frequent descriptions as the most powerful DhimmmicRAT in the country, she was powerless to extend the smoking ban to the private club she shares with other Democrat leaders.